


As if on waking, from a dream

by glaucusAtlanticus



Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Auguste (Captive Prince) Lives, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Politics, Visions in dreams, it mostly works, more because Auguste loves him than because he is actually good at politics, young Laurent is trying very hard to do politics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-27
Updated: 2019-06-27
Packaged: 2020-05-20 16:30:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19380484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glaucusAtlanticus/pseuds/glaucusAtlanticus
Summary: In the weeks before Marlas, Laurent has strange and troubling dreams, and fights to avert a future he barely understands.





	As if on waking, from a dream

"Please, Auguste." The trailing laces of his sleeves bite into his palms as his hands twist. He forces them still, breathes deeply. "You can't fight him."

He hates this. That he cannot hide his fear, that he is forced to hide it anyway, even from Auguste. That he has been reduced to catching his brother's sleeve in the hall outside their rooms, in the rapidly-falling dark, his jacket half unlaced.

Even alone in the hallway, they stand in duplicate: as brothers and as princes. This has always been true. But lately, with the war councils, with the constant motion of strange nobles through the palace, the layers have pulled sharply apart. Laurent feels stuck on the far side of a duplicate gulf, the younger brother, the spare prince, to be sheltered and protected. Even Auguste, who has always held their brotherhood above all else between them, has been pulled so strongly into his role as crown prince and commander that Laurent can barely reach him.

Hence this hallway, his hand on his brother's sleeve. Hence the tone of August's gaze, closer to the lofty concern of a prince than a worried brother.

"Is this because of the dreams?"

Laurent sucks in a breath, painful around the lump in his throat. Of course, the dreams. Again he curses the gulf between them, his confidence in his brother turned back on him from this princely distance. Between princes, to share so much so openly is a weakness. Lately he has been learning the steps of moving through court, the clever truths and half-lies. He has never faced Auguste across this chessboard, before. He swallows again, gathers his thoughts.

"Paschal says that dreams are the way the mind comes to understand everything we've seen and learned. They combine our thoughts and fears and pieces of knowledge we don't yet know how to connect, and try to fit them together over and over in new forms, until they make sense."

This is true, Paschal has told him such many times now, over cups of soothing  tea at odd hours of the night. He ignores Auguste's sceptical look, the unspoken fact between them that on the first night he came crying to Auguste's rooms, he believed in the dreams completely. It has been months since then. Auguste does not know that Laurent is still writing careful notes when he wakes up each morning. Or that the dreams have continued in an unbroken narative, each night a new scene, each perfectly consistent with the last. Auguste has been busy, and Laurent has gone more and more lately to Paschal when the nightmares wake him. Whatever Auguste knows of his stubbornness of character, it is entirely plausible that he has come to doubt the dreams since then. He focuses on Paschal's calm and reasoned explanations, channeling his level voice, as if he believed it.

"What dreams show us is not true, but sometimes it provides insight. Certain things we have overlooked in waking life might become the focus of a dream, drawing them to our awareness. Of course, these insights have to be investigated in reality, to prove their worth. But I have been investigating."

Auguste, at least, looks interested now, though the concern has not left him. He gestures Laurent in to his rooms, where they settle on the over-plush couches. In this familiar context, Laurent finds himself relaxing without meaning too. He must be careful not to slip into the comfort of confiding in his brother, if he is to maintain this tenous new field of play between them, fellow princes at the negotiating table.

"In the war council today, they were discussing if you should meet the Akielon prince in a duel, to decide the battle."

He is not supposed to know this. But he has been getting better at following secrets through the palace, in this case to the barracks where Auguste's personal guards could not resist boasting among themselves of the great duel their prince might face. The thought turns his blood to ice. He is brought back vividly to the first moment of the first nightmare, meeting the defiant gaze of the man chained to the floor while the knowledge screams through him: _this man killed your brother._

Auguste, of course, knows this. He knows every detail of the first few dreams. His expression moves quickly from surprise at Laurent's knowledge of the council meeting, to a sort of wry pride at his clever spying, then turns again towards doubtful concern at Laurent's judgment around the nightmares. Laurent has to keep talking.

"I understand the purpose of such a duel is to save the needless bloodshed of the soldiers, which of course is honorable. But there is no good outcome."

Surprise again. He rushes on.

"One of you will die there. If you win, we may hold our claim on Delfuer, for a time. But Theomedes will be outraged by the loss of his son, and with the support of Patras they will lay siege to the border again and again, until they have claimed it. They may have enough honor to let a duel decide the outcome of a battle, but they will not let it decide the war. After all, if they had any respect for the claim laid by past victories, they would not be besieging Delfuer now.  
And if you loose, will they have the honor to stop at Delfuer? Without you, father would have to remove himself from the front lines, as I am too young to inherit. We would be forced into a weak defensive stance, pushed back towards Arles, without any alliances or support from the north. Theomedes is greedy, he seeks to outdo the reach of his ancestors, and rule two kingdoms if he could."

His voice cracks on the mention of Auguste's death but he continues in a rush, pulling on all the unspoken fears that circle in the war chambers. Akeilos is pressing a terrible and dishonorable advantage, attacking Vere so soon after the death of the queen and the loss of the Kemptian alliance. With such a brutal beggining, no one knows how the war will end, or how far they will go.

Auguste looks troubled, but still doubtful. He turns to face Laurent more fully on the couch, adressing him almost as he would an advisor.

"What else would you have me do, little brother? If I do not fight him, hundreds of soldiers will fight and die in my place. If they push on towards the capital, what else can we do to hold them back, but fight as fiercely as we're able?"

"Treat with him." Laurent rushes on past his brother's shocked noise. "Theomedes has no honor, but Damianos is known to be fair and just in his judgements at court. Father's spies in the Akeilon army say he is known as an honorable commander, that he hands out punishment fairly and manages his troops well."

He is mixing facts, here, notes from the spies reports with his own notes hidden in the locked box beneath his mattress. Of course the spies have no report on Damianos's judgements in petty court - he is not sure if Damianos has even gained those duties yet, though it is likely for his age. He is thinking of Damen's steady presence at his shoulder and quiet advice, of his fair treatment of the men under his command, of his honest face across a map in the flickering torchlight. He pulls his thoughts together. Emphasizes the intelligence that Auguste has likely heard, of the Akielon army and its generals. He knows Auguste values the thoughtful command of his men, that he will see honor and respect in a commander who takes care of his troops. Auguste is frowning, though, unconvinced.

"You would have me forge a treaty with men who are too dishonorable to trust on the battlefield? What assurance would that give that they will not return to attack as soon as our backs are turned?"

"If they forged a treaty and broke it, Patras would abandon their allience, and they would loose their greatest advantage. In a treaty to split the land, there could be negotiations of trade routes and safe passage through to Vask and even Kempt, and over regions of choice farmland, until they are so pinned down in the details of the advantages they have been granted that they are afraid to upset the treaty and loose them. They might have the advantage on the battlefield, but we Veretians have the upper hand in negotiations and contracts."

Laurent is out of breath, his heart is pounding. Auguste looks thoughtful, the same serious considering expression he gives his advisors.

"I will consider it," he says, and the tone has a heavy finality that says this is as far as Laurent will get tonight. He breathes in, reminds himself he still has time. There is at least a week yet before the royal contingent rides out from the palace.

Something else surfaces suddenly, urgently, to his attention. Uncle is going with them.

"Auguste -" he says, without thinking it through. "Uncle is - you cannot trust him."

Auguste jerks out of his contemplation to stare.

"Why ever not?"

Laurent is scrambling, unprepared. Here he has no evidence, all his attempts at spying have been evaded. Auguste at least does not know this is from the dreams. But he is certain - he has been watching, he has seen the direction of his uncle's gaze. Only he can't find any pets, any names, even a whisper of a contract. It would be a comfort, if he wasn't sure they existed anyway, outside his reach. He is just as certain of his uncle's treachery, but has even less to show for it. Even in the dreams, that fight is not yet won, and he can't seem to find so much as a foothold to stand against him. The sensation is almost like screaming without a voice.

Fighting down emotions that are not even his own - or are, but his other self, someone he can still barely imagine becoming - he focuses on what is easiest to say.

"He is... his mind is sick and twisted. He... covets children, as if they were pets."

He feels sick. More than once he has woke retching, on this wave of emotion.

Auguste looks stricken, and horrified.

"He will have to be stripped of his estate, exiled... or perhaps kept here under watch... But, Laurent. That will have to wait. He is our father's chief advisor, to remove him from the council now would throw the war planning into chaos."

Laurent stares, horrified, at this train of logic. He can't make a claim of treachery without at least some evidence, he has to push this case against his uncle's moral character for exactly the purpose of removing him from the war council, or his father's life is forfeit -

Auguste misreads his horror - or perhaps, sees it for what it is, behind Laurent's racing thoughts. Suddenly deadly calm, he asks, "Laurent. Has he looked at you?"

Mutely, Laurent nods.

Auguste's eyes are on fire. He leans forward across the space between the couches, catches Laurent's hand in his own.

"I won't let him touch you. I'll kill him myself if I have to."

Laurent curls into the couch. Under the full weight of Auguste's brotherly attention, for the first time in so long, his careful act of fellow princes collapses.

"You can't die," he says desperately.

A series of terrible possibilities pass between them. If their father would turn a blind eye - he so often does, towards Laurent. If Laurent would be left alone with their uncle while their father continued the campaign. The worst, which Laurent knows all too well, in which his uncle is Regent for all those years.

Auguste squeezes his hand. The desperate worry in his eyes settles into a calm determination.

"Alright," he says. "I won't fight Damianos. I'll treat with him."

**Author's Note:**

> This was written and formatted entirely on my phone, so apologies for any typos, and also let me know if I didn't catch all the places autocorrect borked up the names!
> 
> Also timeline issues... I'm sure there's some, it's 2 in the morning, who knows.
> 
> I was kinda hoping to write more on young Laurent's feelings about his future self, and the experience of emotions that belong to someone else, who both is and is not you. But it doesn't really end up fitting anywhere. I might add a bit more exploration of this au concept, if inspiration strikes!


End file.
